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Jason Moran: Ten
ByMateen contributes "The Subtle One," vaguely reminiscent of Mal Waldron's "Soul Eyes." His acoustic bass guitar pops nicely in the mix and it serves his soloing well on the Monk tune and "Play to Live," co-written by Moran and the late Andrew Hill. Waits' free-spirited rhythm, so key to the Bandwagon's very identity, is particularly alive during Jaki Byard's stride-inflected "To Bob Vatel of Paris" and Leonard Bernstein's "Big Stuff," a Billie Holiday vehicle originally from the ballet Fancy Free. The spirit of electric Miles Davis seems to rear its head on "Gangsterism Over 10 Years," a disguised variant of the Bandwagon's de facto theme song.
Moran has a way of finding oddball elegance in a huge variety of music, and his treatment of Conlon Nancarrow's "Study No. 6" shows an ability to reinvent a specific theme not once but twice. The piece plays off a tension between the A Major and natural minor scales and Moran's ethereal second version is closer in spirit to the original. The first version, driven by Waits' lightly persistent mallets, is quicker in pace, tightly conceived but ready at an instant to break free of tempo confines. In a word, it's been Bandwagonized.
Track Listing
Blue Blocks; RKF in the Land of Apartheid; Feedback Pt. 2; Crepuscule with Nellie; Study No. 6; Pas de DeuxLines Ballet; Study No. 6; Gangsterism Over 10 Years; Big Stuff; Play to Live; The Subtle One; To Bob Batel of Paris; Old Babies.
Personnel
Album information
Title: Ten | Year Released: 2010 | Record Label: Blue Note Records
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Ten